


I, Knight of Ren

by idrilhadhafang



Series: The Story Of Kylo [2]
Category: Star Wars Sequel Trilogy
Genre: Alternative Perspective, Canon Compliant, Canon Typical Violence, Conflicted Kylo Ren, Kylo Ren Angst, Kylo Ren Has Issues, Kylo Ren is Not Nice, M/M, Movie: Star Wars: The Force Awakens, POV First Person, POV Kylo Ren, Slightly one-sided Poe Dameron/Kylo Ren
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-06-16
Updated: 2019-06-15
Packaged: 2020-05-12 16:34:29
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,562
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19232926
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/idrilhadhafang/pseuds/idrilhadhafang
Summary: In which we get inside Kylo’s head during the events of The Force Awakens.





	I, Knight of Ren

**Author's Note:**

> Disclaimer: I own nothing.
> 
> Author’s Notes: I decided that I would post the sequel early so I had some idea as to where I was going.

It’s Supreme Leader Snoke who sends me to Jakku. 

“The last piece of the map is there,” he says, “In the hands of Lor San Tekka. You remember him, don’t you, Kylo Ren?”

”I do.” When I was a child, Lor was a sort of uncle to me. I remember him being kind to me, but that was then, this is now. 

“There’s something more,” Snoke says, “Your friend Poe Dameron is on Jakku.”

”P — Dameron?” I say. My breath hitches. “He means nothing to me.”

”I do pray that your thoughts are clear, Kylo Ren.”

As his hologram disappears, I pray the same.

***

The flight to Jakku is, actually, a long one. Plenty of time to, in the meantime, meditate. I dislike being alone with my own thoughts, but the Supreme Leader says that it will help me become stronger in the Dark Side. I can only hope that that’s the case. I am not a strong Force user, after all; at least, I don’t feel strong. A strong Force user wouldn’t have doubts. Maybe I’ll end up like Darth Revan or Bastila Shan or Darth Sion — wasted potential, all of it. 

That’s my biggest fear. Wasted potential. Disappointment. I know that I don’t want to be...that. Back in the Jedi Order, my uncle — no, Skywalker — alternated between fear of my abilities and believing I was incompetent and incomplete. Truly an exercise in whiplash.

I wonder what will happen when I catch up with Skywalker. Killing him may very well be a pleasure. I try to remember the fact that he basically made me feel like nothing. That he hated me. Even when I was a boy. 

Good. Draw on that anger. It will make you complete.

I think of someone else. Poe Dameron, who I loved. Having to leave him behind. It was for the best, of course; he was too rare to let his light go out so easily. Taking him with me would have snuffed out his light. I needed training, needed it to make me complete. He needed to stay with the Republic, keep it safe.

And it dawns on me that I still love him. No. I can’t feel those things. But I know I hate myself, not just Skywalker. What had Bastila Shan said to Revan when he had found her?  _There’s too much anger inside me now, too much hatred and fear._ Bastila Shan was wasted potential, but she...this feeling is all too familiar to me too.

If only I didn’t feel conflict. If only I could hate Poe Dameron with the fury a Resistance terrorist deserves.

Dear stars...

The shuttle shudders as it comes out of hyperspace in that moment, and I exit the meditation room. There is, unfortunately, no time to vent my frustrations. Some call them tantrums, but they at least work for me, to get the anger out of my system. Snoke would call it a waste, and he is wise, but old habits do die hard.

”Sir,” the pilot says. I still enjoy piloting, naturally, but in times like my failed attempt to meditate, I do need to leave the piloting to someone else. “We’ve reached Jakku.”

I can see that. I have no idea why Lor San Tekka would choose such a worthless graveyard, but no accounting for taste, I suppose. “Prepare to land.”

We do land, and it’s chaos. The planet echoes with the damage the stormtroopers have done. Stormtroopers herd villagers like livestock. Two of them practically drag Lor San Tekka to me, and I notice that unlike my memories of him, he’s old and weary with bloodshot eyes. Ben Solo would have pitied him. I cannot afford it.

I walk towards him, and study him. “Look how old you’ve become,” I say.

”Something far worse,” he says, “Has happened to you.”

Really? Is that the best he can do? Childish retorts? I ignore it; I have come so far. Forget my episode in my shuttle; it was nothing. My will was shaken but I am stronger for it. “You know what I’ve come for,” I say.

He’s stalling. “I know where you come from,” he says, “Before you called yourself Kylo Ren.”

It does not matter if he calls me Ben Solo in front of the whole village. That starship has flown, anyway. “The map to Skywalker,” I say. “We know you’ve found it. And now you’re going to give it to the First Order!” 

I have no desire to torture. Not at first. Torture is...distasteful; the first time that I did it, I vomited afterwards. I haven’t told anyone that — no one must know that the mighty Kylo Ren vomited after his first interrogation — but it still stands out in my memory. 

So Lor San Tekka can just hand it over. He must. He has to.

”The First Order rose from the Dark Side,” Tekka says. “You did not.”

I hate him for this. It’s white hot behind my eyes, threatening to boil over. “I’ll show you,” I say, “The Dark Side.”

”You may try,” Tekka says, and is that compassion he’s offering me? I hate it. I want him to hate me with the fury I deserve. To fear me like I deserve to be feared. I have commanded the Knights of Ren. I have come further than Snoke’s other apprentices; even he said as much. “But you cannot deny the truth that is your family.”

I’ll take pleasure in gutting this stupid old man.

”You’re so right,” I say, wryly, and slice him down. The villagers gasp — good. They fear me. As they should — and a shot rings out. I block it in time, freezing it and the shooter — Poe Dameron, I realize with a jolt — in one move.

My Force powers are still mostly defensive in nature. I don’t see the use for sadistic abilities such as Force Lightning, and we have too few men for me to Force Choke. They’re remnants from the Academy, but they are still useful.

The stormtroopers haul Poe over, force him to his knees — and I know there are more pleasant instances where I’ve imagined Poe on his knees. None of which involve being forced to kneel by overly dramatic stormtroopers.

I squat next to him, meet his eyes. At least he hates me — though a part of me hurts to realize it. Why do I hurt at the idea that he hates me? I would see him break before — but I can’t do it. 

Our eyes meet. I am struck by how beautiful he is, even after a decade of being apart from him. He’s almost classically, heroically good-looking, only emphasized by the way he looks at me with such determination and anger. I cannot help but envy him, naturally; my own face could hardly measure up. And even after a decade, he is a brilliant gleaming star in the Force, persistently Light without being a Jedi.

I hate him for it. I love him too.

”So who talks first?” Poe says. “You talk first, I talk first?”

I can read what he thinks and feels. It’s not a formal interrogation, like the ones I am used to, but I can pull out a critical piece of information. “The old man gave it to you,” I say, softly. I’m not ready to interrogate him. To rummage through his mind and his thoughts. I could extract it from him with one pull — but I won’t.

I will put off the interrogation as long as I can.

”It’s just very hard to understand you,” he says, “With the — ”

”Search him,” I order the stormtroopers.

”Apparatus,” he finishes. 

The stormtroopers pat him down. Our eyes are locked all the while; I am glad that he cannot read my face with the mask on. There are some secrets that I need to keep.

”Nothing, sir,” one of the troopers says.

”Put him on board,” I say.

There’s something about the look in his eyes that makes me wonder what it would be like if I kissed him...but some things cannot be. It doesn’t stop what I feel. 

Phasma walks over, her chrome armor gleaming. “Sir,” she says, “The villagers.”

I know what I must do. After all, they are good as complicit in harboring two terrorists, they are good as enemy combatants. Ben Solo wouldn’t have had the stomach to do it. I do. “Kill them all.”

The villagers scream in terror as the stormtroopers’ rifles train on them. “On my command,” Phasma says, “Fire.”

They do. I can vaguely hear Poe pleading with me not to — and I wonder what he expected from us. We do not suffer enemies gladly, after all.

I cross back towards the shuttle, but not before turning towards one stormtrooper. A stormtrooper with a bloody handprint on his helmet. There is something very odd about him, though I cannot place it. I only know that there is a disturbance in the Force, hard to make out over the echoes of destruction in the village, but there nonetheless.

He is scared. But he is of no importance. Harmless. I head back to my shuttle. Poe is handcuffed in one of the seats. He looks at me with such hatred — and he is right to hate me. I am, after all, the monster that the Resistance would love to kill.


End file.
